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The Garden of Eden
from John Parkinson’s “Paradisi in Sole Paradisus Terrestris.”

1656

PLANT LORE, LEGENDS, and LYRICS.

EMBRACING THE
Myths, Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore of the Plant Kingdom.

BY
RICHARD FOLKARD, JUN.

LONDON:
Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, and Rivington,
Crown Buildings, 188, Fleet Street.

1884.
[All Rights Reserved.]

PRINTED BY R. FOLKARD AND SON,
22, DEVONSHIRE STREET, QUEEN SQUARE, BLOOMSBURY,
LONDON, W.C.

PREFACE.

Having, some few years ago, been associated in the conduct of a journal devoted to horticulture, I amassed for literary purposes much of the material made use of in the present volume. Upon the discontinuance of the journal, I resolved to classify and arrange the plant lore thus accumulated, with a view to its subsequent publication, and I have since been enabled to enrich the collection with much Continental and Indian lore (which I believe is quite unknown to the great majority of English readers) from the vast store to be found in Signor De Gubernatis’ volumes on plant tradition, a French edition of which appeared two years ago, under the title of La Mythologie des Plantes. To render the present work comprehensive and at the same time easy of reference, I have divided the volume into two sections, the first of which is, in point of fact, a digest of the second; and I have endeavoured to enhance its interest by introducing some few reproductions of curious illustrations pertaining to the subjects treated of. Whilst preferring no claim for anything beyond the exercise of considerable industry, I would state that great care and attention has been paid to the revision of the work, and that as I am both author and printer of my book, I am debarred in that dual capacity from even palliating my mistakes by describing them as “errors of the press.” In tendering my acknowledgments to Prof. De Gubernatis and other authors I have consulted on the various branches of my subject, I would draw attention to the annexed list of the principal works to which reference is made in these pages.

RICHARD FOLKARD, Jun.

Cricklewood, August, 1884.

Principal Works Referred to.

• Adams, H. C. ‘Flowers; their Moral, Language, and Poetry.’
• Albertus Magnus. De Mirabilibus Mundi.
• Aldrovandus. Ornithologia.
• Bacon, Lord. ‘Sylva Sylvarum,’ and ‘Essay on Gardens.’
• Bauhin, C. De plantis a divis sanctisve nomen habentibus (1591).
• Brand, J. ‘Popular Antiquities.’
• Bright, H. A. ‘A Year in a Lancashire Garden.’
• Campbell, J. F. ‘Tales of the Western Highlands.’
• ‘Choice Notes from Notes and Queries.’
• Coles, W. ‘Adam in Eden’ (1657); and ‘The Art of Simpling’ (1656).
• ‘The Compleat English Gardener’ (1683).
• ‘The Countryman’s Recreation’ (1640).
• Croker, T. C. ‘Fairy Legends of the South of Ireland.’
• Culpeper, N. ‘British Herbal.’
• Cutts, Rev. E. ‘Decoration of Churches.’
• Darwin, E. ‘The Botanic Garden’: a Poem.
• Dasent, Sir G. W. ‘Popular Tales from the Norse.’
• Daubeny, C. ‘Trees and Shrubs of the Ancients.’
• Day, Rev. Lal Behari. ‘Folk-Tales of Bengal.’
• De Gubernatis, A. La Mythologie des Plantes; ou les Légendes du Règne Végétal.
• Dixon, W. G. ‘The Land of the Morning: Japan.’
• ‘The Dutch Gardener’ (1703).
• Dyer, Rev. T. F. ‘English Folk-lore.’
• Ennemoser, J. ‘History of Magic.’
• Evelyn, J. ‘Sylva: a Discourse of Forest Trees’ (1662); ‘The French Gardener’ (1658); and ‘Kalendarium Hortense’ (1664).
• ‘The Expert Gardener’ (1640).
• ‘The Fairy Family.’
• Farrer, J. A. ‘The Names of Flowers’ (In ‘Cornhill Magazine,’ Vol. XLV.).
• Fitzherbarde, Sir Anthony. ‘Boke of Husbandry’ (1523).
• Fleetwood, Bishop. ‘Curiosities of Nature and Art in Husbandry and Gardening’ (1707).
• ‘Flower Lore’ (M’Caw & Co., Belfast).
• Gerarde, J. ‘The Herbal; or, General Historie of Plantes.’ Edited by Johnson (1633).
• Grimm, J. ‘Teutonic Mythology’ (Translated by Stallybrass.)
• Henderson, W. ‘Folk-lore of the Northern Counties.’
• Hunt, R. ‘Popular Romances of the West of England.’
• Ingram, J. ‘Flora Symbolica.’
• Jameson, Mrs. ‘Sacred and Legendary Art’;
• ‘Legends of the Monastic Orders’; and ‘Legends of the Madonna.’
• Karr, Alphonse. ‘A Tour Round my Garden.’
• Kelly, W. K. ‘Curiosities of Indo-European Tradition and Folk-lore.’
• Kent, Miss. ‘Flora Domestica,’ and ‘Sylvan Sketches.’
• King, R. J. ‘Sketches and Studies.’
• Kircherus. De Luce et Umbra, Ars Magnetica, &c.
• ‘The Language of Flowers’ (Saunders and Otley).
• Liger, Louis. ‘The Retired Gardener’ (1717).
• Loudon, J. C. ‘Encyclopædia of Gardening.’
• Loudon, Mrs. ‘Companion to the Flower Garden.’
• Macer Floridus. De Viribus Herbarum (1527).
• Mallet, M. ‘Northern Antiquities.’
• Mannhardt, Prof. Baumkultus der Germanen; Germanische Mythen; and Wald- und Feld-Kulte.
• Marmier, X. Légendes des Plantes.
• Marshall, S. ‘Plant Symbolism’ (In ‘Natural History Notes,’ Vol. II.).
• Martyn, Thos. ‘Miller’s Gardener’s and Botanist’s Dictionary.’
• Matthiolus. De Plantis (1585).
• Maundevile, Sir John. ‘Voiage and Travaile’ (Edit. 1725).
• Mentzelius, C. Index Nominum Plantarum Multilinguis (1682).
• Moore, T. ‘Lalla Rookh.’
• Müller, Max. ‘Selected Essays.’
• Murray, E. C. G. ‘Songs and Legends of Roumania.’
• Newton, W. ‘Display of Heraldry.’
• Nork. Mythologie der Volkssagen.
• Oldenburg, Dr. H. ‘Buddha: his Life, Doctrine, and Order.’
• Parkinson, J. ‘Paradisi in Sole: Paradisus Terrestris’ (1656).
• Paxton, Sir Joseph. ‘Botanical Dictionary.’
• Percival, Rev. P. ‘The Land of the Veda.’
• Phillips, J. ‘Flora Historical.’
• Pirie, M. ‘Flowers, Grasses, and Shrubs.’
• Plat, Sir Hugh, Knt. ‘The Garden of Eden’ (1600).
• Pliny. ‘Natural History.’
• Porta, J. B. Phytognomica (1588).
• Pratt, A. ‘Flowering Plants and Ferns of Great Britain.’
• Prior, Dr. ‘Popular Names of British Plants.’
• Ralston, W. R. ‘Forest and Field Myths’ (In ‘Contemporary Review,’ Vol. XXXI.).
• Rapin, R. De Hortorum Cultura (Gardiner’s trans., 1665).
• Rawlinson, Rev. G. ‘The Religions of the Ancient World.’
• Reade, W. W. ‘The Veil of Isis; or, the Mysteries of the Druids.’
• Rea, J. ‘Flora, Ceres, and Pomona’ (1665).
• Rimmel, E. ‘The Book of Perfumes.’
• The ‘Royal and Imperial Dream Book.’
• Sawyer, F. E. ‘Sussex Folk-lore and Customs.’
• Shway Yoe. ‘The Burman: his Life and Notions.’
• Thorpe, B. ‘Yule-tide Stories.’
• Tighe, W. ‘The Plants’: a Poem.
• Timbs, J. ‘Popular Errors;’ ‘Curiosities of History;’ and ‘Things Not Generally Known.’
• Turner, Robert. ‘Botanologia: The Brittish Physician; or, the Nature and Vertues of English Plants’ (1687).
• Turner, W. ‘The Herball.’
• Tusser, Thomas. ‘Five Hundred Points of Husbandry’ (1562).
• White, Rev. Gilbert. ‘Natural History of Selborne.’
• Wilkinson, Sir G. ‘The Ancient Egyptians.’
• Zahn, J. Speculæ Physico-Mathematico-Historicæ (1696).

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

List of Illustrations.

The head and tail pieces on pp. [xiii.], [xxiv.], [1], [8], [20], [21], [26], [40], [64], [74], [116], [136], [164], [175], [200], [592], and [610], are reproductions from originals in old herbals, &c.

Part the First.

INTRODUCTION.

The analogy existing between the vegetable and animal worlds, and the resemblances between human and tree life, have been observed by man from the most remote periods of which we have any records. Primitive man, watching the marvellous changes in trees and plants, which accurately marked not only the seasons of the year, but even the periods of time in a day, could not fail to be struck with a feeling of awe at the mysterious invisible power which silently guided such wondrous and incomprehensible operations. Hence it is not astonishing that the early inhabitants of the earth should have invested with supernatural attributes the tree, which in the gloom and chill of Winter stood gaunt, bare, and sterile, but in the early Spring hastened to greet the welcome warmth-giving Sun by investing itself with a brilliant canopy of verdure, and in the scorching heat of Summer afforded a refreshing shade beneath its leafy boughs. So we find these men of old, who had learnt to reverence the mysteries of vegetation, forming conceptions of vast cosmogonic world- or cloud-trees overshadowing the universe; mystically typifying creation and regeneration, and yielding the divine ambrosia or food of immortality, the refreshing and life-inspiring rain, and the mystic fruit which imparted knowledge and wisdom to those who partook of it. So, again, we find these nebulous overspreading world-trees connected with the mysteries of death, and giving shelter to the souls of the departed in the solemn shade of their dense foliage.

Looking upon vegetation as symbolical of life and generation, man, in course of time, connected the origin of his species with these shadowy cloud-trees, and hence arose the belief that humankind first sprang from Ash and Oak-trees, or derived their being from Holda, the cloud-goddess who combined in her person the form of a lovely woman and the trunk of a mighty tree. In after years trees were almost universally regarded either as sentient beings or as constituting the abiding places of spirits whose existence was bound up in the lives of the trees they inhabited. Hence arose the conceptions of Hamadryads, Dryads, Sylvans, Tree-nymphs, Elves, Fairies, and other beneficent spirits who peopled forests and dwelt in individual trees—not only in the Old World, but in the dense woods of North America, where the Mik-amwes, like Puck, has from time immemorial frolicked by moonlight in the forest openings. Hence, also, sprang up the morbid notion of trees being haunted by demons, mischievous imps, ghosts, nats, and evil spirits, whom it was deemed by the ignorant and superstitious necessary to propitiate by sacrifices, offerings, and mysterious rites and dances. Remnants of this superstitious tree-worship are still extant in some European countries. The Irminsul of the Germans and the Central Oak of the Druids were of the same family as the Asherah of the Semitic nations. In England, this primeval superstition has its descendants in the village maypole bedizened with ribbons and flowers, and the Jack-in-the-Green with its attendant devotees and whirling dancers. The modern Christmas-tree, too, although but slightly known in Germany at the beginning of the present century, is evidently a remnant of the pagan tree-worship; and it is somewhat remarkable that a similar tree is common among the Burmese, who call it the Padaytha-bin. This Turanian Christmas-tree is made by the inhabitants of towns, who deck its Bamboo twigs with all sorts of presents, and pile its roots with blankets, cloth, earthenware, and other useful articles. The wealthier classes contribute sometimes a Ngway Padaytha, or silver Padaytha, the branches of which are hung with rupees and smaller silver coins wrapped in tinsel or coloured paper. These trees are first carried in procession, and afterwards given to monasteries on the occasion of certain festivals or the funerals of Buddhist monks. They represent the wishing-tree, which, according to Burmese mythology, grows in the Northern Island and heaven of the nats or spirits, where it bears on its fairy branches whatever may be wished for.

The ancient conception of human trees can be traced in the superstitious endeavours of ignorant peasants to get rid of diseases by transferring them to vicarious trees, or rather to the spirits who are supposed to dwell in them; and it is the same idea that impels simple rustics to bury Elder-sticks and Peach-leaves to which they have imparted warts, &c. The recognised analogy between the life of plants and that of man, and the cherished superstition that trees were the homes of living and sentient spirits, undoubtedly influenced the poets of the ancients in forming their conceptions of heroes and heroines metamorphosed into trees and flowers; and traces of the old belief are to be found in the custom of planting a tree on the birth of an infant; the tree being thought to symbolise human life in its destiny of growth, production of fruit, and multiplication of its species; and, when fully grown, giving shade, shelter, and protection. This pleasant rite is still extant in our country as well as in Germany, France, Italy, and Russia; and from it has probably arisen a custom now becoming very general of planting a tree to commemorate any special occasion. Nor is the belief confined to the Old World, for Mr. Leland has quite recently told us that he observed near the tent of a North American Indian two small evergreens, which were most carefully tended. On enquiry he found the reason to be that when a child is born, or is yet young, its parent chooses a shrub, which growing as the child grows, will, during the child’s absence, or even in after years, indicate by its appearance whether the human counterpart be ill or well, alive or dead. In one of the Quādi Indian stories it is by means of the sympathetic tree that the hero learns his brother’s death.

In the middle ages, the old belief in trees possessing intelligence was utilised by the monks, who have embodied the conception in many mediæval legends, wherein trees are represented as bending their boughs and offering their fruits to the Virgin and her Divine Infant. So, again, during the flight of the Holy Family into Egypt, trees are said to have opened and concealed the fugitives from Herod’s brutal soldiery. Certain trees (notably the Aspen) are reputed to have been accursed and to have shuddered and trembled ever after on account of their connexion with the tragedy of Calvary; while others are said to have undergone a similar doom because they were attainted by the suicide of the traitor Judas Iscariot.

Seeing that the reverence and worship paid to trees by the ignorant and superstitious people was an institution impossible to uproot, the early Christian Church sought to turn it to account, and therefore consecrated old and venerated trees, built shrines beneath their shade, or placed on their trunks crucifixes and images of the Blessed Virgin. Legends connecting trees with holy personages, miracles, and sacred subjects were, in after years, freely disseminated; one of the most remarkable being the marvellous history of the Tree of Adam, in which it is sought to connect the Tree of Paradise with the Tree of Calvary. Evelyn summarises this misty tradition in the following sentence:—“Trees and woods have twice saved the whole world: first, by the Ark, then by the Cross; making full amends for the evil fruit of the tree in Paradise by that which was borne on the tree in Golgotha.” In course of time the flowers and plants which the ancients had dedicated to their pagan deities were transferred by the Christian Church to the shrines of the Virgin and sainted personages; this is especially noticeable in the plants formerly dedicated to Venus and Freyja, which, as being the choicest as well as the most popular, became, in honour of the Virgin Mary, Our Lady’s plants. Vast numbers of flowers were in course of time appropriated by the Church, and consecrated to her saints and martyrs—the selection being governed generally by the fact that the flower bloomed on or about the day on which the Church celebrated the saint’s feast. These appropriations enabled the Roman Catholics to compile a complete calendar of flowers for every day in the year, in which each flower is dedicated to a particular saint.

But if the most beautiful flowers and plants were taken under the protection of the Church, and dedicated to the memory of her holiest and most venerated members, so, also, certain trees, plants, and flowers—which, either on account of their noxious properties, or because of some legendary associations, were under a ban—became relegated to the service of the Devil and his minions. Hence we find a large group of plants associated with enchanters, sorcerers, wizards and witches, many of which betray in their nomenclature their Satanic association, and are, even at the present day, regarded suspiciously as ill-omened and unlucky. These are the plants which, in the dark days of witchcraft and superstition, were invested with mysterious and magical properties,—the herbs which were employed by hags and witches in their heathenish incantations, and from which they brewed their potions and hell-broths. Thus Ben Jonson, in his fragment, ‘The Sad Shepherd,’ makes one of his characters say, when speaking of a witch:—

“He knows her shifts and haunts,

And all her wiles and turns. The venom’d plants

Wherewith she kills! where the sad Mandrake grows,

Whose groans are dreadful! the dead-numming Nightshade!

The stupefying Hemlock! Adder’s-tongue!

And Martagan!”

The association of plants with magic, sorcery, and the black art dates from remote times. The blind Norse god Hödr slew Baldr with a twig of Mistletoe. In the battles recorded in the Vedas as being fought by the gods and the demons, the latter employ poisonous and magical herbs which the gods counteract with counter-poisons and health-giving plants. Hermes presented to Ulysses the magical Moly wherewith to nullify the effects of the potions and spells of the enchantress Circe, who was well acquainted with all sorts of magical herbs. The Druids professed to know the secrets of many magical plants which they gathered with mysterious and occult rites. The Vervain, Selago, Mistletoe, Oak, and Rowan were all said by these ancient priests and lawgivers to be possessed of supernatural properties; and remnants of the old belief in their magical powers are still extant.

In works on the subject of plant lore hitherto published in England, scarcely any reference has been made to the labours in the field of comparative mythology of Max Müller, Grimm, Kuhn, Mannhardt, De Gubernatis, and other eminent scholars, whose erudite and patient investigations have resulted in the accumulation of a vast amount of valuable information respecting the traditions and superstitions connected with the plant kingdom. Mr. Kelly’s interesting work on Indo-European Tradition, published some years ago, dealt, among other subjects, with that of plant lore, and drew attention to the analogy existing between the myths and folk-lore of India and Europe relating more especially to plants which were reputed to possess magical properties. Among such plants, peculiar interest attaches to a group which, according to Aryan tradition, sprang from lightning—the embodiment of fire, the great quickening agent: this group embraces the Hazel, the Thorn, the Hindu Sami, the Hindu Palasa, with its European congener the Rowan, and the Mistletoe: the two last-named plants were, as we have seen, employed in Druidic rites. These trees are considered of good omen and as protectives against sorcery and witchcraft: from all of them wishing-rods (called in German Wünschelruthen) and divining-rods have been wont to be fashioned—magical wands with which, in some countries, cattle are still struck to render them prolific, hidden springs are indicated, and mineral wealth is discovered. Such a rod was thought to be the caduceus of the god Hermes, or Mercury, described by Homer as being a rod of prosperity and wealth. All these rods are cut with a forked end, a shape held to be symbolic of lightning and a rude effigy of the human form. It is interesting to note that in the Rigveda the human form is expressly attributed to the pieces of Asvattha wood used for kindling the sacred fire—a purpose fulfilled by the Thorn in the chark or instrument employed for producing fire by the Greeks. Another group of plants also connected with fire and lightning comprises the Mandrake (the root of which is forked like the human form), the Fern Polypodium Filix mas (which has large pinnate leaves), the Sesame (called in India Thunderbolt-flower), the Spring-wort, and the Luck-flower. The Mandrake and Fern, like King Solomon’s Baharas, are said to shine at night, and to leap about like a Will-o’the-wisp: indeed, in Thuringia, the Fern is known as Irrkraut, or Misleading Herb, and in Franche Comté this herb is spoken of as causing belated travellers to become light-headed or thunder-struck. The Mandrake-root and the Fern-seed have the magical property of granting the desires of their possessors, and in this respect resemble the Sesame and Luck-flower, which at their owners’ request will disclose treasure-caves, open the sides of mountains, clefts of rocks, or strong doors, and in fact render useless all locks, bolts, and bars, at will. The Spring-wort, through the agency of a bird, removes obstacles by means of an explosion caused by the electricity or lightning of which this plant is an embodiment. Akin to these are plants known in our country as Lunary or Moonwort and Unshoe-the-Horse, and called by the Italians Sferracavallo—plants which possess the property of unshoeing horses and opening locks. A Russian herb, the Rasrivtrava, belongs to the same group: this plant fractures chains and breaks open locks—virtues also claimed for the Vervain (Eisenkraut), the Primrose (Schlüsselblume), the Fern, and the Hazel. It should be noted of the Mistletoe (which is endowed by nature with branches regularly forked, and has been classified with the lightning-plants), that the Swedes call it “Thunder-besom,” and attribute to it the same powers as to the Spring-wort. Like the Fly-Rowan (Flög-rönn) and the Asvattha, it is a parasite, and is thought to spring from seeds dropped by birds upon trees. Just as the Druids ascribed peculiar virtues to a Mistletoe produced by this means on an Oak, so do the Hindus especially esteem an Asvattha which has grown in like manner upon a Sami (Acacia Suma).

It is satisfactory to find that, although the Devil has had certain plants allotted to him wherewith to work mischief and destruction through the agency of demons, sorcerers, and witches, there are yet a great number of plants whose special mission it is to thwart Satanic machinations, to protect their owners from the dire effects of witchcraft or the Evil Eye, and to guard them from the perils of thunder and lightning. In our own country, Houseleek and Stonecrop are thought to fulfil this latter function; in Westphalia, the Donnerkraut (Orpine) is a thunder protective; in the Tyrol, the Alpine Rose guards the house-roof from lightning; and in the Netherlands, the St. John’s Wort, gathered before sunrise, is deemed a protection against thunderstorms. This last plant is especially hateful to evil spirits, and in days gone by was called Fuga dæmonum, dispeller of demons. In Russia, a plant, called the Certagon, or Devil-chaser, is used to exorcise Satan or his fiends if they torment an afflicted mourner; and in the same country the Prikrit is a herb whose peculiar province it is to destroy calumnies with which mischief-makers may seek to interfere with the consummation of lovers’ bliss. Other plants induce concord, love, and sympathy, and others again enable the owner to forget sorrow.

Plants connected with dreams and visions have not hitherto received much notice; but, nevertheless, popular belief has attributed to some few—and notably the Elm, the Four-leaved Clover, and the Russian Son-trava—the subtle power of procuring dreams of a prophetic nature. Numerous plants have been thought by the superstitious to portend certain results to the sleeper when forming the subject of his or her dreams. Many examples of this belief will be found scattered through these pages.

The legends attached to flowers may be divided into four classes—the mythological, the ecclesiastical, the historical, and the poetical. For the first-named we are chiefly indebted to Ovid, and to the Jesuit René Rapin, whose Latin poem De Hortorum Cultura contains much curious plant lore current in his time. His legends, like those of Ovid, nearly all relate to the transformation by the gods of luckless nymphs and youths into flowers and trees, which have since borne their names. Most of them refer to the blossoms of bulbous plants, which appear in the early Spring; and, as a rule, white flowers are represented as having originated from tears, and pink or red flowers from blushes or blood. The ecclesiastical legends are principally due to the old Catholic monks, who, while tending their flowers in the quietude and seclusion of monastery gardens, doubtless came to associate them with the memory of some favourite saint or martyr, and so allowed their gentle fancy to weave a pious fiction wherewith to perpetuate the memory of the saint in the name of the flower. For many of the historical legends we are also indebted to monastic writers, and they mostly pertain to favourite sons and daughters of the Church. Amongst what we have designated poetical legends must be included the numerous fairy tales in which flowers and plants play a not unimportant part, as well as the stories which connect plants with the doings of Trolls, Elves, Witches, and Demons. Many such legends, both English and foreign, will be found introduced in the following pages.

It has recently become the fashion to explain the origin of myths and legends by a theory which makes of them mere symbols of the phenomena appertaining to the solar system, or metaphors of the four seasons and the different periods in a day’s span. Thus we are told that, in the well-known story of the transformation of Daphne into a Laurel-bush, to enable her to escape the importunities of Apollo (see [p. 404]), we ought not to conceive the idea of the handsome passionate god pursuing a coy nymph until in despair she calls on the water-gods to change her form, but that, on the contrary, we should regard the whole story as simply an allegory implying that “the dawn rushes and trembles through the sky, and fades away at the sudden appearance of the bright sun.” So, again, in the myth of Pan and Syrinx (p. 559), in which the Satyr pursues the maiden who is transformed into the Reed from which Pan fashioned his pipes, the meaning intended to be conveyed is, we are told, that the blustering wind bends and breaks the swaying Rushes, through which it rustles and whistles. Prof. De Gubernatis, in his valuable work La Mythologie des Plantes, gives a number of clever explanations of old legends and myths, in accordance with the “Solar” theory, which are certainly ingenious, if somewhat monotonous. Let us take, as an example, the German story of the Watcher of the Road, which appears at [page 326]. In this tale a lovely princess, abandoned for a rival by her attractive husband, pines away, and at last desiring to die if only she can be sure of going somewhere where she may always watch for him, is transformed into the wayside Endive or Succory. Here is the Professor’s explanation:—“Does not the fatal rival of the young princess, who cries herself to death on account of her dazzling husband’s desertion, and who even in death desires still to gaze on him, symbolise the humid night, which every evening allures the sun to her arms, and thus keeps him from the love of his bride, who awakens every day with the sun, just as does the flower of the Succory?” These scientific elucidations of myths, however dexterous and poetical they may be, do not appear to us applicable to plant legends, whose chief charm lies in their simplicity and appositeness; nor can we imagine why Aryan or other story-tellers should be deemed so destitute of inventive powers as to be obliged to limit all their tales to the description of celestial phenomena. In the Vedas, trees, flowers, and herbs are invoked to cause love, avert evil and danger, and neutralise spells and curses. The ancients must, therefore, have had an exalted idea of their nature and properties, and hence it is not surprising that they should have dedicated them to their deities, and that these deities should have employed them for supernatural purposes. Thus Indra conquered Vritra and slew demons by means of the Soma; Hermes presented the all-potent Moly to Ulysses; and Medea taught Jason how to use certain enchanted herbs; just as, later in the world’s history, Druids exorcised evil spirits with Mistletoe and Vervain, and sorcerers and wise women used St. John’s Wort and other plants to ward off demons and thunderbolts. The ancients evidently regarded their gods and goddesses as very human, and therefore it would seem unnecessary and unjust so to alter their tales about them as to explain away their obvious meaning.

Flowers are the companions of man throughout his life—his attendants to his last resting place. They are, as Mr. Ruskin says, precious always “to the child and the girl, the peasant and the manufacturing operative, to the grisette and the nun, the lover and the monk.” Nature, in scattering them over the earth’s surface, would seem to have designed to cheer and refresh its inhabitants by their varied colouring and fragrance, and to elevate them by their wondrous beauty and delicacy; from them, as old Parkinson truly wrote, “we may draw matter at all times, not onely to magnifie the Creator that hath given them such diversities of forms, sents, and colours, that the most cunning workman cannot imitate, ... but many good instructions also to our selves; that as many herbs and flowers, with their fragrant sweet smels do comfort and as it were revive the spirits, and perfume a whole house, even so such men as live vertuously, labouring to do good, and profit the Church, God, and the common wealth by their pains or pen, do as it were send forth a pleasing savour of sweet instructions.” The poet Wordsworth reminds us that

“God made the flowers to beautify

The earth, and cheer man’s careful mood;

And he is happiest who hath power

To gather wisdom from a flower,

And wake his heart in every hour

To pleasant gratitude.”

In these pages will be found many details as to the use of these beauteous gems of Nature, both by the ancient races of the world and by the people of our own generation; their adaptation to the Church’s ceremonial and to popular festivals; their use as portents, symbols, and emblems; and their employment as an adornment of the graves of loved ones. Much more could have been written, had space permitted, regarding their value to the architect and the herald. The Acanthus, Lotus, Trefoil, Lily, Vine, Ivy, Pomegranate, Oak, Palm, Acacia, and many other plants have been reproduced as ornaments by the sculptor, and it is a matter of tradition that to the majestic aspect of an avenue of trees we owe the lengthy aisle and fretted vault of the Gothic order of architecture. In the field of heraldry it is noticeable that many nations, families, and individuals have, in addition to their heraldic badges, adopted plants as special symbols, the circumstances of their adoption forming the groundwork of a vast number of legends: a glance at the index will show that some of these are to be discovered in the present work. Many towns and villages owe their names to trees or plants; and not a few English families have taken their surnames from members of the vegetable kingdom. In Scotland, the name of Frazer is derived from the Strawberry-leaves (fraises) borne on the family shield of arms, and the Gowans and Primroses also owe their names to plants. The Highland clans are all distinguished by the floral badge or Suieachantas which is worn in the bonnet. For the most part the plants adopted for these badges are evergreens; and it is said that the deciduous Oak which was selected by the Stuarts was looked upon as a portent of evil to the royal house.

The love of human kind for flowers would seem to be shared by many members of the feathered tribe. Poets have sung of the passion of the Nightingale for the Rose and of the fondness of the Bird of Paradise for the dazzling blooms of the Tropics: the especial liking, however, of one of this race—the Amblyornis inornata—for flowers is worthy of record, inasmuch as this bird-gardener not only erects for itself a bower, but surrounds it with a mossy sward, on which it continually deposits fresh flowers and fruit of brilliant hue, so arranged as to form an elegant parterre.

We have reached our limit, and can only just notice the old traditions relating to the sympathies and antipathies of plants. The Jesuit Kircher describes the hatred existing between Hemlock and Rue, Reeds and Fern, and Cyclamen and Cabbages as so intense, that one of them cannot live on the same ground with the other. The Walnut, it is believed, dislikes the Oak, the Rowan the Juniper, the White-thorn the Black-thorn; and there is said to be a mutual aversion between Rosemary, Lavender, the Bay-tree, Thyme, and Marjoram. On the other hand, the Rose is reported to love the Onion and Garlic, and to put forth its sweetest blooms when in propinquity to those plants; and a bond of fellowship is fabled to exist between a Fig-tree and Rue. Lord Bacon, noticing these traditionary sympathies and antipathies, explains them as simply the outcome of the nature of the plants, and his philosophy is not difficult to be understood by intelligent observers, for, as St. Anthony truly said, the great book of Nature, which contains but three leaves—the Heavens, the Earth, and the Sea—is open for all men alike.

PLANT LORE, LEGENDS, AND LYRICS.

CHAPTER I.
The World-Trees of the Ancients.

It is a proof of the solemnity with which, from the very earliest times, man has invested trees, and of the reverence with which he has ever regarded them, that they are found figuring prominently in the mythology of almost every nation; and despite the fact that in some instances these ancient myths reach us, after the lapse of ages, in distorted and grotesque forms, they would seem to be worthy of preservation, if only as curiosities in plant lore. In some cases the myth relates to a mystic cloud-tree which supplies the gods with immortal fruit; in others to a tree which imparts to mankind wisdom and knowledge; in others to a tree which is the source and fountain of all life; and in others, again, to the actual descent of mankind from anthropological or parent trees. In one cosmogony—that of the Iranians—the first human pair are represented as having grown up as a single tree, the fingers or twigs of each one being folded over the other’s ears, till the time came when, ripe for separation, they became two sentient beings, and were infused by Ormuzd with distinct human souls.

But besides these trees, which in some form or other benefit and populate the earth, there are to be found in ancient myths records of illimitable trees that existed in space whilst yet the elements of creation were chaotic, and whose branches overshadowed the universe. One of the mythical accounts of the creation of the world represents a vast cosmogonic tree rearing its enormous bulk from the midst of an ocean before the formation of the earth had taken place; and this conception, it may be remarked, is in consonance with a Vedic tradition that plants were created three ages before the gods. In India the idea of a primordial cosmogonic tree, vast as the world itself, and the generator thereof, is very prevalent; and in the Scandinavian prose Edda we find the Skalds shadowing forth an all-pervading mundane Ash, called Yggdrasill, beneath whose shade the gods assemble every day in council, and whose branches spread over the whole world, and even reach above heaven, whilst its roots penetrate to the infernal regions. This cloud-tree of the Norsemen is thought to be a symbol of universal nature.

The accompanying illustration is taken from Finn Magnusen’s pictorial representation of the Yggdrasill myth, and depicts his conception of

The Norse World-Tree.

According to the Eddaic accounts, the Ash Yggdrasill is the greatest and best of all trees. One of its stems springs from the central primordial abyss—from the subterranean source of matter—runs up through the earth, which it supports, and issuing out of the celestial mountain in the world’s centre, called Asgard, spreads its branches over the entire universe. These wide-spread branches are the æthereal or celestial regions; their leaves, the clouds; their buds or fruits, the stars. Four harts run across the branches of the tree, and bite the buds: these are the four cardinal winds. Perched upon the top branches is an eagle, and between his eyes sits a hawk: the eagle symbolises the air, the hawk the wind-still æther. A squirrel runs up and down the Ash, and seeks to cause strife between the eagle and Nidhögg, a monster, which is constantly gnawing the roots: the squirrel signifies hail and other atmospherical phenomena; Nidhögg and the serpents that gnaw the roots of the mundane tree are the volcanic agencies which are constantly seeking to destroy earth’s foundations. Another stem springs in the warm south over the æthereal Urdar fountain, where the gods sit in judgment. In this fountain swim two swans, the progenitors of all that species: these swans are, by Finn Magnusen, supposed to typify the sun and moon. Near this fountain dwell three maidens, who fix the lifetime of all men, and are called Norns: every day they draw water from the spring, and with it sprinkle the Ash in order that its branches may not rot and wither away. This water is so holy, that everything placed in the spring becomes as white as the film within an egg-shell. The dew that falls from the tree on the earth men call honey-dew, and it is the food of the bees. The third stem of Yggdrasill takes its rise in the cold and cheerless regions of the north (the land of the Frost Giants), over the source of the ocean, typified by a spring called Mimir’s Well, in which wisdom and wit lie hidden. Mimir, the owner of this spring, is full of wisdom because he drinks of its waters. One day Odin came and begged a draught of water from the well, which he obtained, but was obliged to leave one of his eyes as a pledge for it. This myth Finn Magnusen thinks signifies the descent of the sun every evening into the sea (to learn wisdom from Mimir during the night); the mead quaffed by Mimir every morning being the ruddy dawn, that, spreading over the sky, exhilarates all nature.

[enlarge]

[TO FACE [PAGE 2].

Yggdrasill, the Mundane Tree.
From Finn Magnusen’s ‘Eddalæren.’

The Hindu World-Tree.

The Indian cosmogonic tree is the symbol of vegetation, of universal life, and of immortality. In the sacred Vedic writings it receives the special names of Ilpa, Kalpadruma, Kalpaka-taru, and Kalpavriksha, on the fruits of which latter tree the first men sustained and nourished life. In its quality of Tree of Paradise, it is called Pârijâta; and as the ambrosial tree—the tree yielding immortal food—it is known as Amrita and Soma. This mystic world-tree of the Hindus, according to the Rigveda, is supernaturally the God Brahma himself; and all the gods are considered as branches of the divine parent stem—the elementary or fragmentary form of Brahma, the vast overspreading tree of the universe. In the Vedas this celestial tree is described as the Pippala (Peepul), and is alluded to as being in turns visited by two beauteous birds—the one feeding itself on the fruit (typifying probably the moon or twilight); the other simply hovering, with scintillating plumage, and singing melodiously (typifying perhaps the sun or daybreak).

Under the name of Ilpa (the Jamboa, or Rose-apple) the cosmogonic tree is described as growing in the midst of the lake Ara in Brahma’s world, beyond the river that never grows old, from whence are procured the waters of eternal youth. Brahma imparts to it his own perfume, and from it obtains the sap of vitality. To its branches the dead cling and climb, in order that they may enter into the regions of immortality.

As the Kalpadruma, Kalpaka-taru, and Kalpavriksha, the Indian sacred writings describe a cloud-tree, which, by its shadows, produced day and night before the creation of sun and moon. This cosmogonic tree, which is of colossal proportions, grows in the midst of flowers and streamlets on a steep mountain. It fulfils all desires, imparts untold bliss, and, what in the eyes of Buddhists constitutes its chief sublimity, it gives knowledge and wisdom to humanity; in a word it combines within its mystic branches all riches and all knowledge.

As the Soma, the world-tree becomes in Indian mysticism a tree of Paradise, at once the king of all trees and vegetation, and the god Soma to be adored. It furnishes the divine ambrosia or essence of immortality, concealed sometimes in the clouds, sometimes in the billows of the soft and silvery light that proceeds from the great-Soma, the great Indu, the moon. Hence this mystic tree, from the foliage of which drops the life-giving Soma, is sometimes characterised as the Hindu Moon-Tree. Out of this cosmogonic tree the immortals shaped the heaven and the earth. It is the Tree of Intelligence, and grows in the third heaven, over which it spreads its mighty branches; beneath it Yama and the Pitris dwell, and quaff the immortalising Soma with the gods. At its foot grow plants of all healing virtue, incorporations of the Soma. Two birds sit on its top, one of which eats Figs, whilst the other simply watches. Other birds press out the Soma juice from its branches. This ambrosial tree, besides dropping the precious Soma, bears fruit and seed of every kind known in the world.

The World-Tree of the Buddhists.

The Sacred Tree of Buddha is in the complex theology of his followers represented under different guises: it is cosmogonic, it imparts wisdom, it produces the divine ambrosia or food of immortality, it yields the refreshing and life-inspiring rain, and it affords an abiding-place for the souls of the blessed.

The supernatural and sacred Tree of Buddha, the cloud-tree, the Tree of Knowledge, the Tree of Wisdom, the Ambrosia-tree, is covered with divine flowers; it glows and sparkles with the brilliance of all manner of precious stones; the root, the trunk, the branches, and the leaves are formed of gems of the most glorious description. It grows in soil pure and delightfully even, to which the rich verdure of grass imparts the tints of a peacock’s neck. It receives the homage of the gods; and the arm of Mâyâ (the mother of Buddha) when she stretches it forth to grasp the bough which bends towards her, shines as the lightning illumines the sky. Beneath this sacred tree, the Tree of Knowledge, Buddha, at whose birth a flash of light pierced through all the world, sat down with the firm resolve not to rise until he had attained the knowledge which “maketh free.” Then the Tempter, Mâra, advanced with his demoniacal forces: encircling the Sacred Tree, hosts of demons assailed Buddha with fiery darts, amid the whirl of hurricanes, darkness, and the downpour of floods of water, to drive him from the Tree. Buddha, however, maintained his position unmoved; and at length the demons were compelled to fly. Buddha had conquered, and in defeating the Tempter Mâra, and obtaining possession of his Tree of Knowledge, he had also obtained possession of deliverance. Prof. De Gubernatis, in explaining this myth, characterises the tree as the cloud-tree: in the clouds the heavenly flame is stored, and it is guarded by the dark demons. In the Vedic hymns, the powers of light and darkness fight their great battle for the clouds, and the ambrosia which they contain; this is the identical battle of Buddha with the hosts of Mâra. In the cloud-battle the ambrosia (amrita) which is in the clouds is won; the enlightenment and deliverance which Buddha wins are also called an ambrosia; and the kingdom of knowledge is the land of immortality.

There is a tradition current in Thibet that the Tree of Buddha received the name of Târâyana, that is to say, The Way of Safety, because it grew by the side of the river that separates the world from heaven; and that only by means of its overhanging branches could mankind pass from the earthly to the immortal bank.

The material tree of Buddha is generally represented either under the form of the Asvattha (the Ficus religiosa), or of the Udumbara (the Ficus glomerata), which appeared at the birth of Buddha; but in addition to these guises, we find it also associated with the Asoka (Jonesia Asoka), the Palasa (Butea frondosa), the Bhânuphalâ (Musa sapientum), and sometimes with the Palmyra Palm (Borassus flabelliformis).

Under one of these trees the ascetic, Gautama Buddha, one momentous night, went through successively purer and purer stages of abstraction of consciousness, until the sense of omniscient illumination came over him, and he attained to the knowledge of the sources of mortal suffering. That night which Buddha passed under the Tree of Knowledge on the banks of the river Nairanjanâ, is the sacred night of the Buddhist world. There is a Peepul-tree (Ficus religiosa) at Buddha Gayâ which is regarded as being this particular tree: it is very much decayed, and must have been frequently renewed, as the present tree is standing on a terrace at least thirty feet above the level of the surrounding country.

The Iranian World-Tree.

The world-tree of the Iranians is the Haoma, which is thought to be the same as the Gaokerena of the Zendavesta. This Haoma, the sacred Vine of the Zoroastrians, produces the primal drink of immortality after which it is named. It is the first of all trees, planted in heaven by Ormuzd, in the fountain of life, near another tree called the “impassive” or “inviolable,” which bears the seeds of every kind of vegetable life. Both these trees are situated in a lake called Vouru Kasha, and are guarded by ten fish, who keep a ceaseless watch upon a lizard sent by the evil power, Ahriman, to destroy the sacred Haoma. The “inviolable” tree is also known both as the eagle’s and the owl’s tree. Either one or the other of these birds (probably the eagle) sits perched on its top. The moment he rises from the tree, a thousand branches shoot forth; when he settles again he breaks a thousand branches, and causes their seed to fall. Another bird, that is his constant companion, picks up these seeds and carries them to where Tistar draws water, which he then rains down upon the earth with the seeds it contains. These two trees—the Haoma and the eagle’s or “inviolable”—would seem originally to have been one. The lizard sent by Ahriman to destroy the Haoma is known to the Indians as a dragon, the spoiler of harvests, and the ravisher of the Apas, or brides of the gods, Peris who navigate the celestial sea.

The Assyrian Sacred Tree.

In intimate connection with the worship of Assur, the supreme deity of the Assyrians, “the God who created himself,” was the Sacred Tree, regarded by the Assyrian race as the personification of life and generation. This tree, which was considered coeval with Assur, the great First Source, was adored in conjunction with the god; for sculptures have been found representing figures kneeling in adoration before it, and bearing mystic offerings to hang upon its boughs. In these sculptured effigies of the Sacred Tree the simplest form consists of a pair of ram’s horns, surmounted by a capital composed of two pairs of rams’ horns, separated by horizontal bands, above which is a scroll, and then a flower resembling the Honeysuckle ornament of the Greeks. Sometimes this blossoms, and generally the stem also throws out a number of smaller blossoms, which are occasionally replaced by Fir-cones and Pomegranates. In the most elaborately-portrayed Sacred Trees there is, besides the stem and the blossoms, a network of branches, which forms a sort of arch, and surrounds the tree as it were with a frame.

The Phœnicians, who were not idolaters, in the ordinary acceptation of the word—inasmuch as they did not worship images of their deities, and regarded the ever-burning fire on their altars as the sole emblem of the Supreme Being,—paid adoration to this Sacred Tree, effigies of which were set up in front of the temples, and had sacrifices offered to them. This mystic tree was known to the Jews as Asherah. At festive seasons the Phœnicians adorned it with boughs, flowers, and ribands, and regarded it as the central object of their worship.

The Mother Tree of the Greeks, Romans, and Teutons.

The Greeks appear to have cherished a tradition that the first race of men sprang from a cosmogonic Ash. This cloud Ash became personified in their myth as a daughter of Oceanos, named Melia, who married the river-god Inachos, and gave birth to Phoroneus, in whom the Peloponnesian legend recognised the fire-bringer and the first man. According to Hesychius, however, Phoroneus was not the only mortal to whom the Mother Ash gave birth, for he tells us distinctly that the race of men was “the fruit of the Ash.” Hesiod also repeats the same fable in a somewhat different guise, when he relates how Jove created the third or brazen race of men out of Ash trees. Homer appears to have been acquainted with this tradition, for he makes Penelope say, when addressing Ulysses: “Tell me thy family, from whence thou art; for thou art not sprung from the olden tree, or from the rock.” The Ash was generally deemed by the Greeks an image of the clouds and the mother of men,—the prevalent idea being that the Meliai, or nymphs of the Ash, were a race of cloud goddesses, daughters of sea gods, whose domain was originally the cloud sea.

But besides the Ash, the Greeks would seem to have regarded the Oak as a tree from which the human race had sprung, and to have called Oak trees the first mothers. This belief was shared by the Romans. Thus Virgil speaks

“Of nymphs and fauns, and savage men, who took

Their birth from trunks of trees and stubborn Oak.”

In another passage the great Latin poet, speaking of the Æsculus, a species of Oak, sacred to Jupiter, gives to it attributes which remind us in a very striking manner of Yggdrasill, the cloud-tree of the Norsemen.

“Æsculus in primis, quæ quantum vortice ad auras

Ætherias, tantum radice in Tartara tendit.”—Georg. ii.

“High as his topmost boughs to heaven ascend,

So low his roots to hell’s dominion tend.”—Dryden.

In the Æneid, Book IV., speaking of the Oak as Quercus, Virgil uses the same expression with regard to the roots of Jove’s tree descending to the infernal regions. Juvenal, also, in his sixth satire, alluding to the beginning of the world, speaks of the human race as formed of clay or born of the opening Oak, which thus becomes the mystical mother-tree of mankind, and, like a mother, sustained her offspring with food she herself created. Thus Ovid tells us that the simple food of the primal race consisted largely of “Acorns dropping from the tree of Jove;” and we read in Homer and Hesiod that the Acorn was the common food of the Arcadians.

The belief of the ancient Greeks and Romans that the progenitors of mankind were born of trees was also common to the Teutons. At the present day, in many parts of both North and South Germany, a hollow tree overhanging a pool is designated as the first abode of unborn infants, and little children are taught to believe that babies are fetched by the doctor from cavernous trees or ancient stumps. “Frau Holda’s tree” is a common name in Germany for old decayed boles; and she herself, the cloud-goddess, is described in a Hessian legend as having in front the form of a beautiful woman, and behind that of a hollow tree with rugged bark.

But besides Frau Holda’s tree the ancient Germans knew a cosmogonic tree, assimilating to the Scandinavian Yggdrasill. The trunk of this Teutonic world-tree was called Irminsul, a name implying the column of the universe, which supports everything.

A Byzantine legend, which is current in Russia, tells of a vast world-tree of iron, which in the beginning of all things spread its gigantic bulk throughout space. Its root is the power of God; its head sustains the three worlds,—heaven, with the ocean of air; the earth, with its seas of water; and hell, with its sulphurous fumes and glowing flames.

Rabbinic traditions make the Mosaic Tree of Life, which stood in the centre of the Garden of Eden, a vast world-tree, resembling in many points the Scandinavian Ash Yggdrasill. A description of this world-tree of the Rabbins, however, need not appear in the present chapter, since it will be found on [page 13].

CHAPTER II.
The Trees of Paradise and the Tree of Adam.

Amongst all peoples, and in all ages, there has lingered a belief possessing peculiar powers of fascination, that in some unknown region, remote and unexplored, there existed a glorious and happy land; a land of sunshine, luxuriance, and plenty, a land of stately trees and beauteous flowers,—a terrestrial Paradise.

A tradition contained in the sacred books of the Parsis states that at the beginning of the world Ormuzd, the giver of all good, created the primal steer, which contained the germs of all the animals. Ahriman, the evil spirit, then created venomous animals which destroyed the steer: while dying, there sprang out of his right hip the first man, and out of his left hip the first man’s soul. From him arose a tree whence came the original human pair, namely Mâshya and Mashyôî who were placed in Heden, a delightful spot, where grew Hom (or Haoma), the Tree of Life, the fruit of which gave vigour and immortality. This Paradise was in Iran. The woman being persuaded by Ahriman, in the guise of a serpent, gave her husband fruit to eat, which was destructive.

The Persians also imagined a Paradise on Mount Caucasus. The Arabians conceived an Elysium in the midst of the deserts of Aden. The pagan Scandinavians sang of the Holy City of Asgard, situated in the centre of the world. The Celts believed an earthly Paradise to exist in the enchanted Isle of Avalon—the Island of the Blest—

“Where falls not hail or rain, or any snow,

Nor even wind blows loudly; but it lies

Deep-meadow’d, happy, fair, with orchard lawn

And bowery hollows.”

The Greeks and Romans pictured to themselves the delightful gardens of the Hesperides, where grew the famous trees that produced Apples of gold; and in the early days of Christendom the poets of the West dreamt of a land in the East (the true Paradise of Adam and Eve, as they believed) in which dwelt in a Palm-tree the golden-breasted Phœnix,—the bird of the sun, which was thought to abide a hundred years in this Elysium of the Arabian deserts, and then to appear in the Temple of the Sun at Heliopolis, fall upon the blazing altar, and, pouring forth a melodious song from or through the orifices of its feathers (which thus formed a thousand organ-pipes), cremate itself, only to rise again from its smoking ashes, and fly back to its home in the Palm-tree of the earthly Paradise. The Russians tell of a terrestrial Paradise to be sought for on the island of Bujan, where grows the vast Oak tree, amidst whose majestic branches the sun nestles to sleep every evening, and from whose summit he rises every morning.

The Hindu religion shadows forth an Elysium on Mount Meru, on the confines of Cashmere and Thibet. The garden of the great Indian god Indra is a spot of unparalleled beauty. Here are to be found an umbrageous grove or wood, where the gods delight to take their ease; cooling fountains and rivulets; an enchanting flower-garden, luminous flowers, immortalising fruits, and brilliantly-plumed birds, whose melody charms the gods themselves. In this Paradise are fine trees, which were the first things that appeared above the surface of the troubled waters at the beginning of the creation; from these trees drop the immortalising ambrosia. The principal tree is the Pârijâta, the flower of which preserves its perfume all the year round, combines in its petals every odour and every flavour, presents to each his favorite colour and most-esteemed perfume, and procures happiness for those who ask it. But beyond this, it is a token of virtue, losing its freshness in the hands of the wicked, but preserving it with the just and honourable. This wondrous flower will also serve as a torch by night, and will emit the most enchanting sounds, producing the sweetest and most varied melody; it assuages hunger and thirst, cures diseases, and remedies the ravages of old age.

The Paradise of Mahomet is situated in the seventh heaven. In the centre of it stands the marvellous tree called Tooba,[1] which is so large that a man mounted on the fleetest horse could not ride round its branches in one hundred years. This tree not only affords the most grateful shade over the whole extent of the Mussulman Paradise; but its boughs are laden with delicious fruits of a size and taste unknown to mortals, and moreover bend themselves at the wish of the inhabitants of this abode of bliss, to enable them to partake of these delicacies without any trouble. The Koran often speaks of the rivers of Paradise as adding greatly to its delights. All these rivers take their rise from the tree Tooba; some flow with water, some with milk, some with honey, and others even with wine, the juice of the grape not being forbidden to the blessed.

We have seen how the most ancient races conceived and cherished the notion of a Paradise of surpassing beauty, situate in remote and unknown regions, both celestial and terrestrial. It is not, therefore, surprising that the Paradise of the Hebrew race—the Mosaic Eden—should have been pictured as a luxuriant garden, stocked with lovely flowers and odorous herbs, and shaded by majestic trees of every description.

We are told, in the second chapter of Genesis, that at the beginning of the world “the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden,” and that out of this country of Eden a river went out “to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads.” These “heads” or rivers are further on, in the Biblical narrative, named respectively Pison, Gihon, Hiddekel, and Euphrates. Many have been the speculations as to the exact site, geographical features, &c., of Eden, and the Divinely-planted Paradise in its midst, and the subject has been one which has ever been fruitful of controversy and conjecture. Sir John Maundevile has recorded that the Garden of Eden, or Paradise, was enclosed by a wall. This old Eastern traveller tells us that although, in the course of his wanderings, he had never actually seen the land of Eden, yet wise men had discoursed to him concerning it. He says: “Paradise Terrestre, as wise men say, is the highest place of earth—that is, in all the world; and it is so high, that it toucheth nigh to the circle of the moon. For it is so high that the flood of Noah might never come to it, albeit it did cover all the earth of the world, all about, and aboven and beneathen, save Paradise alone. And this Paradise is enclosed all about with a wall, and men wist not whereof it is; for the walls be covered all over with moss, as it seemeth. And it seemeth not that the wall is stone of nature. And that wall stretcheth from the South to the North, and it hath not but one entry, that is closed with fire burning, so that no man that is mortal he

dare not enter. And in the highest place of Paradise, exactly in the middle, is a well that casts out the four streams which run by divers lands, of which the first is called Pison, or Ganges, that runs throughout India. And the other is called Nile, or Gyson, which goes through Ethiopia, and after through Egypt. And the other is called Tigris, which runs by Assyria, and by Armenia the Great. And the other is called Euphrates, which runs through Media, Armenia, and Persia. And men there beyond say that all the sweet waters of the world, above and beneath, take their beginning from the well of Paradise, and out of the well all waters come and go.”

Eden (a Hebrew word, signifying “Pleasure”), it is generally conceded, was the most beauteous and luxuriant portion of the world; and the Garden of Eden, the Paradise of Adam and Eve, was the choicest and most exquisite portion of Eden. As regards the situation of this terrestrial Paradise, the Biblical narrative distinctly states that it was in the East, but various have been the speculations as to the precise locality. Moses, in writing of Eden, probably contemplated the country watered by the Tigris and Euphrates—the land of the mighty city of Babylon. Many traditions confirm this view: not only were there a district called Eden, and a town called Paradisus, in Syria, a neighbouring country to Mesopotamia, but in Mesopotamia itself there is a certain region which, as late as the year 1552, was called Eden. Some would localise the Eden of Scripture near Mount Lebanon, in Syria; others between the rivers Tigris and Euphrates, to the west of Babylon; others, again, in the delightful plains of Armenia, or in the highlands of Armenia, where the Tigris and Euphrates have their rise. An opinion very generally held is, that Eden was placed at the junction of several rivers, on a site which is now swallowed up by the Persian Gulf, and that it never existed after the deluge, which effaced this Paradise from the face of a polluted earth. Another theory places Eden in a vast central portion of the globe, comprising a large piece of Asia and a portion of Africa, the four rivers being the Ganges, the Tigris, the Euphrates, and the Nile. Dr. Wild, of Toronto, is of opinion that the Garden of Paradise embraced what we now call Syria. The land that God gave to Abraham and his seed for ever—the Land of Promise, the Holy Land—is the very territory that constituted the Garden of Paradise. “Before the flood,” says the reverend gentleman, “there was in connection with this garden, to the east of it, a gate and a flaming sword, guarding this gate, and a way to the Tree of Life. On that very spot I believe the Great Pyramid of Egypt to be built, to mark where the face of God shone forth to man before the Flood; and the Flood, by changing the land surface through the changing of the ocean bed, changed the centre somewhat, and threw it further south. It is the very centre of the earth now where the Pyramid stands, ... and marks the place where the gate of Eden was before the Flood.”[2]

The Tree of life.

Whatever may have been the site of the land of Eden or Pleasure, Moses, in describing Paradise as its garden (much as we speak of Kent as the Garden of England), doubtless wished to convey the idea of a sanctuary of delight and primal loveliness; indeed, he tells us that “out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.” This Paradise was in the middle of Eden, and in the middle of Paradise was planted the Tree of Life, and, close by, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Into this garden the Lord put the man whom He had formed, “to dress and to keep it,” in other words to till, plant, and sow.

In the very centre of Paradise, in the midst of the land of Eden, grew the Tree of Life. Now, what was this tree? Various have been the conjectures with regard to its nature. The traditions of the Rabbins make the Tree of Life a supernatural tree, resembling the world- or cloud-trees of the Scandinavians and Hindus, and bearing a striking resemblance to the Tooba of the Mahomedan Paradise. They describe the Tree of Life as being of enormous bulk, towering far above all others, and so vast in its girth, that no man, even if he lived so long, could travel round it in less than five hundred years. From beneath the colossal base of this stupendous tree gushed all the waters of the earth, by whose instrumentality nature was everywhere refreshed and invigorated. Regarding these Rabbinic traditions as purely mythical, certain commentators have regarded the Tree of Life as typical only of that life and the continuance of it which our first parents derived from God. Others think that it was called the Tree of Life because it was a memorial, pledge, and seal of the eternal life which, had man continued in obedience, would have been his reward in the Paradise above. Others, again, believe that the fruit of it had a certain vital influence to cherish and maintain man in immortal health and vigour till he should have been translated from the earthly to the heavenly Paradise.

Dr. Wild considers that the Tree of Life stood on Mount Moriah, the very spot selected, in after years, by Abraham, whereon to offer his son Isaac, the type, and the mount to which Christ was led out to be sacrificed. As Eden occupied the centre of the world, and the Tree of Life was planted in the middle of Eden, that spot marked the very centre of the world, and it was necessary that He who was the life of mankind should die in the centre of the world, and act from the centre. Hence, the Tree of Life, destroyed at the flood, on account of man’s wickedness, was replaced on the same spot, centuries after, by the Cross,—converted by the Redeemer into a second and everlasting Tree of Life.

Adam was told he might eat freely of every tree in the garden, excepting only the Tree of Knowledge; we may, therefore, suppose that he would be sure to partake of the fruit of the Tree of Life, which, from its prominent position “in the midst of the garden,” would naturally attract his attention. Like the sacred Soma-tree of the Hindus, the Tree of Life probably yielded heavenly ambrosia, and supplied to Adam food that invigorated and refreshed him with its immortal sustenance. So long as he remained in obedience, he was privileged to partake of this glorious food; but when, yielding to Eve’s solicitations, he disobeyed the Divine command, and partook of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, he found it had given to him the knowledge of evil—something of which he had hitherto been in happy ignorance. He had sinned; he was no longer fit to taste the immortal ambrosia of the Tree of Life; he was, therefore, driven forth from Eden, and lest he should be tempted once again to return and partake of the glorious fruit of the immortalising tree, God “placed at the east of the Garden of Eden cherubims and a flaming sword, which turned every way, to keep the way of the Tree of Life.” Henceforth the immortal food was lost to man: he could no longer partake of that mystic fruit which bestowed life and health. Dr. Wild is of opinion that the Tree of Knowledge stood on Mount Zion, the spot afterwards selected by the Almighty for the erection of the Temple; because, through the Shechinah, men could there obtain knowledge of good and evil.

Some have claimed that the Banana, the Musa paradisiaca, was the Tree of Life, and that another species of the tree, the Musa sapientum, was the Tree of Knowledge; others consider that the Indian sacred Fig-tree, the Ficus religiosa, the Hindu world-tree, was the Tree of Life which grew in the middle of Eden; and the Bible itself contains internal evidence supporting this idea. In Gen. iii. 8, we read that Adam and Eve, conscious of having sinned, “hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden.” Dr. Wright, however, in his Commentary, remarks that, in the original, the word rendered “trees” is singular—“in the midst of the tree of the garden”—consequently, we may infer that Adam and Eve, frightened by the knowledge of their sin, sought the shelter of the Tree of Life—the tree in the centre of the garden; the tree which, if it were the Ficus religiosa, would, by its gigantic stature, and the grove-like nature of its growth, afford them agreeable shelter, and prove a favourite retreat. Beneath the shade of this stupendous Fig-tree, the erring pair reflected upon their lost innocence; and in their conscious shame, plucked the ample foliage of the tree, and made themselves girdles of Fig-leaves. Here they remained hidden beneath the network of boughs which drooped almost to the earth, and thus formed a natural thicket within which they sought to hide themselves from an angry God.

“A pillared shade

High over-arched, with echoing walks between.”—Milton.

The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.

The Tree of Knowledge, in the opinion of some commentators, was so called, not because of any supernatural power it possessed of inspiring those who might eat of it with universal knowledge, as the serpent afterwards suggested, but because by Adam and Eve abstaining from or eating of it after it was prohibited, God would see whether they would prove good or evil in their state of probation.

The tradition generally accepted as to the fruit which the serpent tempted Eve to eat, fixes it as the Apple, but there is no evidence in the Bible that the Tree of Knowledge was an Apple-tree, unless the remark, “I raised thee up under the Apple-tree,” to be found in Canticles viii., 5, be held to apply to our first parents. Eve is stated to have plucked the forbidden fruit because she saw that it was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and that the tree which bore it was “to be desired to make one wise.”

According to an Indian legend, it was the fruit of the Banana tree (Musa paradisiaca or M. sapientum) that proved so fatal to Adam and Eve. We read in Gerarde’s ‘Herbal,’ that “the Grecians and Christians which inhabit Syria, and the Jewes also, suppose it to be that tree of whose fruit Adam did taste.” Gerarde himself calls it “Adam’s Apple-tree,” and remarks of the fruit, that “if it be cut according to the length oblique, transverse, or any other way whatsoever, may be seen the shape and forme of a crosse, with a man fastened thereto. My selfe have seene the fruit, and cut it in pieces, which was brought me from Aleppo, in pickle; the crosse, I might perceive, as the forme of a spred-egle in the root of Ferne, but the man I leave to be sought for by those which have better eies and judgement than my selfe.” Sir John Mandeville gives a similar account of the cross in the Plantain or “Apple of Paradise.” In a work by Léon, called ‘Africa,’ it is stated that the Banana is in that country generally identified with the Tree of Adam. “The Mahometan priests say that this fruit is that which God forbade Adam and Eve to eat; for immediately they eat they perceived their nakedness, and to cover themselves employed the leaves of this tree, which are more suitable for the purpose than any other.” To this day the Indian Djainas are by their laws forbidden to eat either Bananas or Figs. Vincenzo, a Roman missionary of the seventeenth century, after stating that the Banana fruit in Phœnicia bears the effigy of the Crucifixion, tells us that the Christians of those parts would not on any account cut it with a knife, but always broke it with their hands. This Banana, he adds, grows near Damascus, and they call it there “Adam’s Fig Tree.” In the Canaries, at the present time, Banana fruit is never cut across with a knife, because it then exhibits a representation of the Crucifixion. In the island of Ceylon there is a legend that Adam once had a fruit garden in the vicinity of the torrent of Seetagunga, on the way to the Peak. Pridham, in his history of the island, tells us that from the circumstance that various fruits have been occasionally carried down the stream, both the Moormen and Singalese believe that this garden still exists, although now inaccessible, and that its explorer would never return. Tradition, however, affirms that in the centre of this Ceylon Paradise grows a large Banana-tree, the fruit of which when cut transversely exhibits the figure of a man crucified, and that from the huge leaves of this tree Adam and Eve made themselves coverings.

Certain commentators are of opinion that the Tree of Knowledge was a Fig-tree—the Ficus Indica, the Banyan, one of the sacred trees of the Hindus, under the pillared shade of which the god Vishnu was fabled to have been born. In this case the Fig-tree is a tree of ill-omen—a tree watched originally by Satan in the form of a serpent, and whose fruit gave the knowledge of evil. After having tempted and caused Adam to fall by means of its fruit, its leaves were gathered to cover nakedness and shame. Again, the Fig was the tree which the demons selected as their refuge, if one may judge from the fauni ficarii, whom St. Jerome recognised in certain monsters mentioned by the prophets. The Fig was the only tree accursed by Christ whilst on earth; and the wild Fig, according to tradition, was the tree upon which the traitor Judas hanged himself, and from that time has always been regarded as under a bane.

The Citron is held by many to have been the forbidden fruit. Gerarde tells us that this tree was originally called Pomum Assyrium, but that it was known among the Italian people as Pomum Adami; and, writes the old herbalist, “that came by the opinion of the common rude people, who thinke it to be the same Apple which Adam did eate of in Paradise, when he transgressed God’s commandment; whereupon also the prints of the biting appeare therein as they say; but others say that this is not the Apple, but that which the Arabians do call Musa or Mosa, whereof Avicen maketh mention: for divers of the Jewes take this for that through which by eating Adam offended.”

The Pomegranate, Orange, Corn, and Grapes have all been identified as the “forbidden fruit;” but upon what grounds it is difficult to surmise.

After their disobedience, Adam and Eve were driven out of Paradise, and, according to Arabian tradition, Adam took with him three things—an ear of Wheat, which is the chief of all kinds of food; Dates, which are the chief of fruits; and the Myrtle, which is the chief of sweet-scented flowers. Maimonides mentions a legend, cherished by the Nabatheans, that Adam, when he reached the district about Babylon, had come from India, carrying with him a golden tree in blossom, a leaf that no fire would burn, two leaves, each of which would cover a man, and an enormous leaf plucked from a tree beneath whose branches ten thousand men could find shelter.

The Tree of Adam.

There is a legend handed down both by Hebrews and Greeks, that when Adam had attained the ripe age of 900 years, he overtaxed his strength in uprooting an enormous bush, and that falling very sick, and feeling the approach of death, he sent his son Seth to the angel who guarded Paradise, and particularly the way to the Tree of Life, to ask of him some of its ambrosia, or oil of mercy, that he might anoint his limbs therewith, and so regain good health. Seth approached the Tree of Knowledge, of the fruit of which Adam and Eve had once partaken. A youth, radiant as the sun, was seated on its summit, and, addressing Seth, told him that He was the Son of God, that He would one day come down to earth, to deliver it from sin, and that He would then give the oil of mercy to Adam.

The angel who was guarding the Tree of Life then handed to Seth three small seeds, charging him to place them in his father’s mouth, when he should bury him near Mount Tabor, in the valley of Hebron. Seth obeyed the angel’s behests. The three seeds took root, and in a short time appeared above the ground, in the form of three rods. One of these saplings was a branch of Olive, the second a Cedar, the third a Cypress. The three rods did not leave the mouth of Adam, nor was their existence known until the time of Moses, who received from God the order to cut them. Moses obeyed, and with these three rods, which exhaled a perfume of the Promised Land, performed many miracles, cured the sick, drew water from a rock, &c.

After the death of Moses, the three rods remained unheeded in the Valley of Hebron until the time of King David, who, warned by the Holy Ghost, sought and found them there. Hence they were taken by the King to Jerusalem, where all the leprous, the dumb, the blind, the paralysed, and other sick people presented themselves before the King, beseeching him to give them the salvation of the Cross. King David thereupon touched them with the three rods, and their infirmities instantly vanished. After this the King placed the three rods in a cistern, but to his astonishment upon going the next day for them, he discovered they had all three firmly taken root, that the roots had become inextricably interlaced, and that the three rods were in fact reunited in one stem which had shot up therefrom, and had become a Cedar sapling,—the tree that was eventually to furnish the wood of the Cross. This reunion of the three rods was typical of the Trinity. The young Cedar was subsequently placed in the Temple, but we hear nothing more of it for thirty years, when Solomon, wishing to complete the Temple, obtained large supplies of Cedars of Lebanon, and as being well adapted for his purpose cut down the Cedar of the Temple. The trunk of this tree, lying with the other timber, was seen by a woman, who sat down on it, and inspired with the spirit of prophecy cried: “Behold! the Lord predicts the virtues of the Sacred Cross.” The Jews thereupon attacked the woman, and having stoned her, they plunged the sacred wood of the Temple into the piscina probatica, of which the water acquired from that moment healing qualities, and which was afterwards called the Pool of Bethesda. In the hope of profaning it the Jews afterwards employed the sacred wood in the construction of the bridge of Siloam, over which everybody unheedingly passed, excepting only the Queen of Sheba, who, prostrating herself, paid homage to it and prophetically cried that of this wood would one day be made the Cross of the Redeemer.

Thus, although Adam by eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, came to know that which was evil, and could no longer be permitted to partake of the fruit or essence of the Tree of Life, yet, from its seeds, placed in his mouth after death, sprang the tree which produced the Cross of Christ, by means of which he and his race could attain to eternal life.

According to Prof. Mussafia,[3] an authority quoted by De Gubernatis, the origin of this legend of Seth’s visit to Paradise is to be found in the apocryphal gospel of Nicodemus, where it is stated that the Angel Michael refused to give the oil of mercy to Seth, and told him that Christ would one day visit the earth to anoint all believers, and to conduct Adam to the Tree of Mercy. Some of the legends collected by the Professor are very curious.

An Austrian legend records that the Angel Michael gave to Eve and her son Seth a spray with three leaves, plucked from the Tree of Knowledge, with directions to plant it on the grave of Adam. The spray took root and became a tree, which Solomon placed as an ornament in the Temple of Jerusalem, and which was cast into the piscina probatica, where it lay until the day of Christ’s condemnation, when it was taken out and fashioned into the Cross on which He suffered.

A German legend narrates that Eve went with Seth to Paradise, where she encountered the serpent; but the Angel Michael gave her a branch of Olive, which, planted over the grave of Adam, grew rapidly. After the death of Eve, Seth returned to Paradise, and there met the Angel, who had in his hands a branch to which was suspended the half of the Apple which had been bitten by his mother Eve. The Angel gave this to Seth, at the same time recommending him to take as great care of it as of the Olive planted on Adam’s grave, because these two trees would one day become the means of the redemption of mankind. Seth scrupulously watched over the precious branch, and at the hour of his death bequeathed it to the best of men. Thus it came into the hands of Noah, who took it into the Ark with him. After the Deluge, Noah sent forth the dove as a messenger, and it brought to him a branch of the Olive planted on the tomb of Adam. Noah religiously guarded the two precious branches which were destined to be instrumental in redeeming the human race by furnishing the wood of the Cross.

A second German legend states that Adam, when at the point of death, sent Seth to Paradise to gather there for him some of the forbidden fruit (probably this is a mistake for “some of the fruit of the Tree of Life”). Seth hesitated, saying as an excuse that he did not know the way. Adam directed him to follow a tract of country entirely bare of vegetation. Arrived safely at Paradise, Seth persuaded the angel to give him, not the Apple, but simply the core of the Apple tasted by Eve. On Seth returning home, he found his father dead; so extracting from the Apple-core three pips, he placed them in Adam’s mouth. From them sprang three plants that Solomon cut down in order to form a cross—the selfsame cross afterwards borne by our Saviour, and on which He was crucified—and a rod of justice, which, split in the middle, eventually served to hold the superscription written by Pilate, and placed at the head of the Cross.

A legend, current in the Greek Church, claims the Olive as the Tree of Adam: this, perhaps, is not surprising

considering in what high esteem the Greeks have always held the Olive. The legend tells how Seth, going to seek the oil of mercy in Paradise, in consequence of his father’s illness, was told by the angel that the time had not arrived. The angel then presented him with three branches—the Olive, Cedar, and Cypress: these Seth was ordered to plant over Adam’s grave, and the promise was given him that when they produced oil, Adam should rise restored to health. Seth, following these instructions, plaited the three branches together and planted them over the grave of his father, where they soon became united as one tree. After a time this tree was transplanted, in the first place to Mount Lebanon, and afterwards to the outskirts of Jerusalem, and it is there to this day in the Greek Monastery, having been cut down and the timber placed beneath the altar. From this circumstance the Monastery was called, in Hebrew, the Mother of the Cross. This same wood was revealed to Solomon by the Queen of Sheba, and Solomon therefore ordered it to be used in the foundation of a tower; but the tower having been rent in twain by an earthquake which occurred at our Saviour’s birth, the wood was cast into a pool called the probatica piscina, to which it imparted wonderful healing qualities.[4]

There is another somewhat similar Greek legend, in which Abraham takes the place of Adam, and the Pine supersedes the Olive. According to this version, a shepherd met Abraham on the banks of the Jordan, and confessed to him a sin he had committed. Abraham listened, and counselled the erring shepherd to plant three stakes, and to water them carefully until they should bud. After forty days the three stakes had taken the form of a Cypress, a Cedar, and a Pine, having different roots and branches, but one indivisible trunk. This tree grew until the time of Solomon, who wished to make use of it in the construction of the Temple. After several abortive attempts, it was at length made into a seat for visitors to the Temple. The Sibyl Erythræa (the Queen of Sheba) refused to sit upon it, and exclaimed: “Thrice blessed is this wood, on which shall perish Christ, the King and God.” Then Solomon had the wood mounted on a pedestal and adorned with thirty rings or crowns of silver. These thirty rings became the thirty pieces of silver, the price of Judas, the betrayer, and the wood was eventually used for the Saviour’s Cross.

CHAPTER III.
Sacred Trees & Plants of the Ancients.

All the nations of antiquity entertained for certain trees and plants a special reverence, which in many cases degenerated into a superstitious worship. The myths of all countries contain allusions to sacred or supernatural plants. The Veda mentions the heavenly tree which the lightning strikes down; the mythology of the Finns speaks of the celestial Oak which the sun-dwarf uproots; Yama, the Vedic god of death, sits drinking with companies of the blessed, under a leafy tree, just as in the northern Saga Hel’s place is at the foot of the Ash Yggdrasill.

In the eyes of the ancient Persians the tree, by its changes in Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter, appeared as the emblem of human existence, whilst at the same time, by the continuity of its life, it was reverently regarded as a symbol of immortality. Hence it came to pass that in Persia trees of unusual qualities were in course of time looked upon as being the abode of holy and even celestial spirits. Such trees became sacred, and were addressed in prayer by the reverential Parsis, though they eschewed the worship of idols, and honoured the sun and moon simply as symbols. Ormuzd, the good spirit, is set forth as giving this command:—“Go, O Zoroaster! to the living trees, and let thy mouth speak before them these words: I pray to the pure trees, the creatures of Ormuzd.” Of all trees, however, the Cypress, with its pyramidal top pointing to the sky, was to the Parsis the most venerated: hence they planted it before their temples and palaces as symbolic of the celestial fire.

The Oak, the strongest of all trees, has been revered as the emblem of the Supreme Being by almost all the nations of heathendom, by the Jewish Patriarchs, and by the children of Israel, who eventually came to esteem the tree sacred, and offered sacrifices beneath its boughs. Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Teutons, and Celts, all considered the Oak as sacred, and the Druids taught the people of Britain to regard this tree with peculiar reverence and respect. It is frequently mentioned by the Roman poets as the tree of Jove, to whom it was dedicated; and near to Chaonia, a mountainous part of Epirus, was a forest of Oaks, called the Chaonian or Dodonæan Forest, where oracles were given, as some say, by the trees themselves. The world-tree of Romowe, the old centre of the Prussians, was an Oak, and it was reverenced as a tree of great sanctity.

The Indians adored the tree Asoka, consecrated to Vishnu; and the Banyan, in the belief that Vishnu was born amongst its branches.[5]

The Soma-latâ (Sarcostemma aphylla), or sacred plant yielding the immortal fluid offered to the gods on the altars of the Brahmans, is regarded with extreme reverence. The name Amrita, or Immortal Tree, is given to the Euphorbia, Panicum Dactylon, Cocculus cordifolius, Pinus Deodara, Emblica officinalis, Terminalia citrina, Piper longum, and many others. The Holy Basil (Ocimum sanctum) is looked upon as a sacred plant. The Deodar is the Devadâru or tree-god of the Shastras, alluded to in Vedic hymns as the symbol of majesty and power.

To Indra, the supreme god of the Vedic Olympus, are dedicated the Terminalia Arjuna (the Tree of Indra), the Methonica superba (the Flower of Indra), a species of Pumpkin called Indra-vârunikâ (appertaining to Indra and Varuna), the Vitex Negundo (the drink of Indra), the Abrus precatorius, and Hemp (the food of Indra).

To Brahma are sacred the Butea frondosa, the Ficus glomerata, the Mulberry (the seed of Brahma), the Clerodendron Siphonanthus, the Hemionitis cordifolia (leaf of Brahma), the Saccharum Munga (with which is formed the sacred girdle of the Brahmans), and the Poa cynosuroides, or Kusa Grass, a species of Vervain, employed in Hindu sacrificial rites, and held in such sanctity as to be acknowledged as a god.

The Peepul or Bo-tree (Ficus religiosa) is held sacred by Buddhists as the Holy Tree and the Tree of Knowledge.

The Burmese Buddhists surround their Pagodas and religious houses with trees, for which they entertain a high regard. The first holy men dwelt under the shade of forest trees, and from that circumstance, in the Burmese cultus, every Budh is specially connected with some tree—as Shin Gautama with the Banyan, under which he attained his full dignity, and the Shorea robusta, under which he was born and died—and, as we are told, the last Budh of this world cycle, Areemadehya, will receive his Buddhaship under the Mesua ferrea.

The Burman also regards the Eugenia as a plant of peculiar sanctity—a protective from all harm. The Jamboa, or Rose Apple, is held in much reverence in Thibet, where it is looked upon as the representative of the mystical Amrita, the tree which in Paradise produces the amrita or ambrosia of the gods.

The Cedar has always been regarded by the Jews as a sacred tree; and to this day the Maronites, Greeks, and Armenians go up to the Cedars of Lebanon, at the Feast of the Transfiguration, and celebrate Mass at their feet.

To the ancient inhabitants of Northern Europe the Elm and the Ash were objects of especial veneration. Many sacred trees or pillars, formed of the living trunks of trees, have been found in Germany, called Irminseule, one of which was destroyed by Charlemagne in 772, in Westphalia.

The Mountain Ash, or Rowan Tree, was, in olden times, an object of great veneration in Britain; and in Evelyn’s day was reputed of such sanctity in Wales, that there was not a churchyard that did not contain one.

The colossal Baobab (Adansonia) is worshipped as a divinity by the negroes of Senegambia. The Nipa or Susa Palm (Nipa fruticans) is the sacred tree of Borneo. The gigantic Dragon Tree (Dracæna Draco) of Orotava was for centuries the object of deep reverence to the aborigines of the Canary Isles. The Zamang of Guayra, an enormous Mimosa, has from time immemorial been held sacred in the province of Caracas. The Moriche Palm (Mauritia flexuosa) is considered a deity by the Tamancas, a tribe of Oronoco Indians, and is held sacred by the aboriginal Mexicans.

The Nelumbo, or Sacred Bean (Nelumbium speciosum), was the Lotus adored by the Ancient Egyptians, who also paid divine honours to the Onion, Garlic, Acacia, Laurel, Peach-tree, Lentils of various sorts, and the Heliotrope. Wormwood was dedicated to Isis, and Antirrhinum (supposed to be the ancient Cynocephalia, or Dog’s Head) to Osiris.

The sacred Lotus of the East, the flower of the

“Old Hindu mythologies, wherein

The Lotus, attribute of Ganga—embleming

The world’s great reproductive power—was held

In veneration,”

was the Nelumbium speciosum. This mystic flower is a native of Northern Africa, India, China, Japan, Persia, and Asiatic Russia, and in all these countries has, for centuries, maintained its sacred character. It is the Lien-wha of the Chinese, and, according to their theology, enters into the beverage of immortality.

Henna (Lawsonia alba), the flower of Paradise, is dedicated to Mahomet, who characterised it as the “chief of the flowers of this world and the next.”

The Pomegranate-tree was highly reverenced both by the Persians and the Jews. The fruit was embroidered on the hem of Aaron’s sacred robe, and adorned the robes of Persia’s ancient Priest-Kings.

Pine-cones were regarded by the Assyrians as sacred symbols, and as such were used in the decoration of their temples.

In Teutonic and Scandinavian mythology the Rose is sacred to Hulda, the Flax to Bertha, the Spignel to Baldr, and the Hair Moss (Polytrichum commune) is dedicated to Thor’s wife, Sif. Of the divinities after whom the days of the week were named, the Sun has his special flower, the Moon her Daisy, Tyr (Tuesday) the Tys-fiola or March Violet and the Mezereon; Woden (Wednesday) the Geranium sylvaticum (Odin’s Favour) and the Monkshood (Odin’s Helm); Thor (Thursday) the Monkshood (Thor’s Hat) and the Burdock (Thor’s Mantle); Frig (Friday) and Freyja, who is often confounded with her, had many plants dedicated to them, which have since been transferred to Venus and the Virgin Mary, and are not now recognised by the name of either of the Scandinavian goddesses. In the North of Europe, however, the Supercilium Veneris is still known as Freyja’s Hair, and the perfumed Orchis Gymnadenia conopsea as Frigg’s Grass. Sæterne or Sætere (Saturday), the supposed name of an Anglo-Saxon god, is probably but a mere adaptation of the Roman Saturnus. It may, perhaps, be apposite to quote (for what it may be worth) Verstegan’s statement that the Saxons represented “Seater” as carrying a pail of water in which were flowers and fruits, whereby “was declared that with kindly raine he would nourish the earth to bring foorth such fruites and flowers.”

In the Grecian and Roman mythology we find numerous trees and flowers dedicated to the principal divinities. Thus, the

To the Furies was consecrated the Juniper; the Fates wore wreaths of the Narcissus, and the Muses Bay-leaves.

The Grecian Centaurs, half men, half horses, like their Indian brethren the Gandharvas, understood the properties of herbs, and cultivated them; but, as a rule, they never willingly divulged to mankind their knowledge of the secrets of the vegetable world. Nevertheless, the Centaur Chiron instructed Æsculapius, Achilles, Æneas, and other heroes in the polite arts. Chiron had a panacea of his own, which is named after him Chironia Centaurium, or Gentiana Centaurium; and, as a vulnerary, the Ampelos Chironia of Pliny, or Tamus communis. In India, on account of the shape of its leaves, the Ricinus communis is called Gandharvahasta (having the hands of a Gandharva).

CHAPTER IV.
Floral Ceremonies, Wreaths, and Garlands.

The application of flowers and plants to ceremonial purposes is of the highest antiquity. From the earliest periods, man, after he had discovered

“What drops the Myrrh and what the balmy Reed,”

offered up on primitive altars, as incense to the Deity, the choicest and most fragrant woods, the aromatic gums from trees, and the subtle essences he obtained from flowers. In the odorous but intoxicating fumes which slowly ascended, in wreaths heavy with fragrance, from the altar, the pious ancients saw the mystic agency by which their prayers would be wafted from earth to the abodes of the gods; and so, says Mr. Rimmel, “the altars of Zoroaster and of Confucius, the temples of Memphis, and those of Jerusalem, all smoked alike with incense and sweet-scented woods.” Nor was the admiration and use of vegetable productions confined to the inhabitants of the old world alone, for the Mexicans, according to the Abbé Clavigero, have, from time immemorial, studied the cultivation of flowers and odoriferous plants, which they employed in the worship of their gods.

But the use of flowers and odorous shrubs was not long confined by the ancients to their sacred rites; they soon began to consider them as essential to their domestic life. Thus, the Egyptians, though they offered the finest fruit and the finest flowers to the gods, and employed perfumes at all their sacred festivals, as well as at their daily oblations, were lavish in the use of flowers at their private entertainments, and in all circumstances of their every-day life. At a reception given by an Egyptian noble, it was customary, after the ceremony of anointing, for each guest to be presented with a Lotus-flower when entering the saloon, and this flower the guest continued to hold in his hand. Servants brought necklaces of flowers composed chiefly of the Lotus; a garland was put round the head, and a single Lotus-bud, or a full-blown flower was so attached as to hang over the forehead. Many of them, made up into wreaths and devices, were suspended upon stands placed in the room, garlands of Crocus and Saffron encircled the wine cups, and over and under the tables were strewn various flowers. Diodorus informs us that when the Egyptians approached the place of divine worship, they held the flower of the Agrostis in their hand, intimating that man proceeded from a well-watered land, and that he required a moist rather than a dry aliment; and it is not improbable that the reason of the great preference given to the Lotus on these occasions was derived from the same notion.

This fondness of the ancients for flowers was carried to such an extent as to become almost a vice. When Antony supped with Cleopatra, the luxurious Queen of Egypt, the floors of the apartments were usually covered with fragrant flowers. When Sardanapalus, the last of the Assyrian monarchs, was driven to dire extremity by the rapid approach of the conqueror, he chose the death of an Eastern voluptuary: causing a pile of fragrant woods to be lighted, and placing himself on it with his wives and treasures, he soon became insensible, and was suffocated by the aromatic smoke. When Antiochus Epiphanes, the Syrian king, held high festival at Daphne, in one of the processions which took place, boys bore Frankincense, Myrrh, and Saffron on golden dishes, two hundred women sprinkled everyone with perfumes out of golden watering-pots, and all who entered the gymnasium to witness the games were anointed with some perfume contained in fifteen gold dishes, holding Saffron, Amaracus, Lilies, Cinnamon, Spikenard, Fenugreek, &c. When the Roman Emperor Nero sat at banquet in his golden palace, a shower of flowers and perfumes fell upon him; but Heliogabalus turned these floral luxuries into veritable curses, for it was one of the pleasures of this inhuman being to smother his courtiers with flowers.

Both Greeks and Romans caried the delicate refinements of the taste for flowers and perfumes to the greatest excess in their costly entertainments; and it is the opinion of Baccius that at their desserts the number of their flowers far exceeded that of their fruits. The odour of flowers was deemed potent to arouse the fainting appetite; and their presence was rightly thought to enhance the enjoyment of the guests at their banqueting boards:—

“The ground is swept, and the triclinium clear,

The hands are purified, the goblets, too,

Well rinsed; each guest upon his forehead bears

A wreath’d flow’ry crown; from slender vase

A willing youth presents to each in turn

A sweet and costly perfume; while the bowl,

Emblem of joy and social mirth, stands by,

Filled to the brim; and then pours out wine

Of most delicious flavour, breathing round

Fragrance of flowers, and honey newly made,

So grateful to the sense, that none refuse;

While odoriferous fumes fill all the room.”—Xenophanes.

In all places where festivals, games, or solemn ceremonials were held, and whenever public rejoicings and gaiety were deemed desirable, flowers were utilised with unsparing hands.

“Set before your doors

The images of all your sleeping fathers,

With Laurels crowned; with Laurels wreath your posts,

And strew with flowers the pavement; let the priest

Do present sacrifice; pour out the wine,

And call the gods to join with you in gladness.”—Dryden.

In the triumphal processions of Rome the streets were strewed with flowers, and from the windows, roofs of houses, and scaffolds, the people cast showers of garlands and flowers upon the crowds below and upon the conquerors proudly marching in procession through the city. Macaulay says—

“On ride they to the Forum,

While Laurel-boughs and flowers,

From house-tops and from windows,

Fell on their crests in showers.”

In the processions of the Corybantes, the goddess Cybele, the protectress of cities, was pelted with white Roses. In the annual festivals of the Terminalia, the peasants were all crowned with garlands of flowers; and at the festival held by the gardeners in honour of Vertumnus on August 23rd, wreaths of budding flowers and the first-fruits of their gardens were offered by members of the craft.

In the sacrifices of both Greeks and Romans, it was customary to place in the hands of victims some sort of floral decoration, and the presiding priests also appeared crowned with flowers.

“Thus the gay victim with fresh garlands crowned,

Pleased with the sacred pipe’s enlivening sound.

Through gazing crowds in solemn state proceeds,

And dressed in fatal pomp, magnificently bleeds.”—Phillips.

The place erected for offerings was called by the Romans ara, an altar. It was decorated with leaves and grass, adorned with flowers, and bound with woollen fillets: on the occasion of a “triumph” these altars smoked with perfumed incense.

The Greeks had a Nymph of Flowers whom they called Chloris, and the Romans the goddess Flora, who, among the Sabines and the Phoceans, had been worshipped long before the foundation of the Eternal City. As early as the time of Romulus the Latins instituted a festival in honour of Flora, which was intended as a public expression of joy at the appearance of the welcome blossoms which were everywhere regarded as the harbingers of fruits. Five hundred and thirteen years after the foundation of Rome the Floralia, or annual floral games, were established; and after the sibyllic books had been consulted, it was finally ordained that the festival should be kept every 20th day of April, that is four days before the calends of May—the day on which, in Asia Minor, the festival of the flowers commences. In Italy, France, and Germany, the festival of the flowers, or the festival of spring, begins about the same date—i.e., towards the end of April—and terminates on the feast of St. John.

The festival of the Floralia was introduced into Britain by the Romans; and for centuries all ranks of people went out a-Maying early on the first of the month. The juvenile part of both sexes, in the north, were wont to rise a little after midnight, and walk to some neighbouring wood, accompanied with music and the blowing of horns,

“To get sweet Setywall [red Valerian],

The Honeysuckle, the Harlock,

The Lily and the Lady-smock,

To deck their summer hall.”

They also gathered branches from the trees, and adorned them with nosegays and crowns of flowers, returning with their booty homewards, about the rising of the sun, forthwith to decorate their doors and windows with the flowery spoil. The after-part of the day, says an ancient chronicler, was “chiefly spent in dancing round a tall pole, which is called a May-pole; which, being placed in a convenient part of the village, stands there, as it were, consecrated to the goddess of flowers, without the least violation offered it in the whole circle of the year.”

“Your May-pole deck with flowery coronal;

Sprinkle the flowery coronal with wine;

And in the nimble-footed galliard, all,

Shepherd and shepherdess, lively join,

Hither from village sweet and hamlet fair,

From bordering cot and distant glen repair:

Let youth indulge its sport, to old bequeath its care.”

Old John Stowe tells us that on May-day, in the morning, “every man, except impediment, would walk into the sweet meadows and green woods, there to rejoice their spirits with the beauty and savour of sweet flowers, and with the harmony of birds praising God in their kind.” In the days of Henry VIII. it was the custom for all classes to observe the May-day festival, and we are told that the king himself rode a-Maying from Greenwich to Shooter’s Hill, with his Queen Katherine, accompanied by many lords and ladies. Chaucer relates how on May-day

“Went forth all the Court both most and least;

To fetch the floures fresh, and branch and blome,

And namely Hawthorn brought both page and grome;

And then rejoysen in their great delite,

Eke each at other threw the floures bright.

The Primrose, Violette, and the Golde,

With garlands partly blue and white.”

The young maidens repaired at daybreak to the meadows and hill-sides, for the purpose of gathering the precious May-dew, wherewith to make themselves fair for the remainder of the year. This old custom is still extant in the north of England and in some districts of Scotland. Robert Fergusson has told how the Scotch lassies swarmed at daybreak on Arthur’s Seat:

“On May-day in a fairy ring,

We’ve seen them round St. Anthon’s spring

Frae grass the caller dew-draps wring,

To wet their ein,

And water clear as crystal spring.

To synd them clean.”

In Ross-shire the lassies pluck sprigs of Ivy, with the May-dew on them, that have not been touched by steel.

It was deemed important that flowers for May garlands and posies should be plucked before the sun rose on May-day morning; and if perchance, Cuckoo-buds were included in the composition of a wreath, it was destroyed directly the discovery was made, and removed immediately from a posie.

In the May-day sports on the village green, it was customary to choose as May Queen either the best dancer or the prettiest girl, who, at sundown was crowned with a floral chaplet—

“See where she sits upon the grassie greene,

A seemly sight!

Yclad in scarlet, like a mayden queene,

And ermines white.

Upon her head a crimson coronet,

With Daffodils and Damask Roses set:

Bay-leaves betweene,

And Primroses greene

Embellished the sweete Violet.”

—Spenser.

The coronation of the rustic queen concluded the out-door festivities of May-day, although her majesty’s duties would not appear to have been fulfilled until she reached her home.

“Then all the rest in sorrow,

And she in sweet content,

Gave over till the morrow,

And homeward straight they went;

But she of all the rest

Was hindered by the way,

For every youth that met her

Must kiss the Queen of May!”

At Horncastle, in Lincolnshire, there existed, till the beginning of the present century, a ceremony which evidently derived its origin from the Roman Floralia. On the morning of May-day, a train of youths collected themselves at a place still known as the May-bank. From thence, with wands enwreathed with Cowslips they walked in procession to the may-pole, situated at the west end of the town, and adorned on that morning with every variety of wild flowers. Here, with loud shouts, they struck together their wands, and, scattering around the Cowslips, testified their thankfulness for the bounteous promise of spring.

Aubrey (MS., 1686), tells us that in his day “at Woodstock in Oxon they every May-eve goe into the parke, and fetch away a number of Haw-thorne-trees, which they set before their dores.” In Huntingdonshire, fifty years ago, the village swains were accustomed, at sunrise, to place a branch of May in blossom before the door of anyone they wished to honour. In Tuscany the expression, Appiccare il maio ad una porta, has passed into a proverb, and means to lay siege to a maiden’s heart and make love to her. In the vicinity of Valenciennes, branches of Birch or Hornbeam are placed by rural swains at the doors of their sweethearts; thorny branches at the portals of prudes; and Elder boughs at the doors of flirts. In the villages of Provence, on May-day, they select a May Queen. Crowned with a wreath, and adorned with garlands of Roses, she is carried through the streets, mounted on a platform, her companions soliciting and receiving the offerings of the towns-people. In olden times it was customary even among the French nobility to present May to friends and neighbours, or as it was called, esmayer. Sometimes this presenting of May was regarded as a challenge. The custom of planting a May-tree in French towns subsisted until the 17th century: in 1610, one was planted in the court of the Louvre. In some parts of Spain the name of Maia is given to the May Queen (selected generally as being the handsomest lass of the village), who, decorated with garlands of flowers, leads the dances in which the young people spend the day. The villagers in other provinces declare their love by planting, during the preceding night, a large bough or a sapling, decked with flowers, before the doors of their sweethearts. In Greece, bunches of flowers are suspended over the doors of most houses; and in the rural districts, the peasants bedeck themselves with flowers, and carry garlands and posies of wild flowers.

In some parts of Italy, in the May-day rejoicings, a May-tree or a branch in blossom and adorned with fruit and ribbands, plays a conspicuous part: this is called the Maggio, and is probably a reminiscence of the old Grecian Eiresione.

Of the flowers specially dedicated to May, first and foremost is the Hawthorn blossom. In some parts of England the Convallaria is known as May Lily. The Germans call it Mai blume, a name they also apply to the Hepatica and Kingcup. In Devon and Cornwall the Lilac is known as May-flower, and much virtue is thought to be attached to a spray of the narrow-leaf Elm gathered on May morning.

In Asia Minor the annual festival of flowers used to commence on the 28th of April, when the houses and tables were covered with flowers, and every one going into the streets wore a floral crown. In Germany, France, and Italy, the fête of the flowers, or the fête of spring, commences also towards the end of April, and terminates at Midsummer. Athenians, on an early day in spring, every year crowned with flowers all children who had reached their third year, and in this way the parents testified their joy that the little ones had passed the age rendered critical by the maladies incident to infants. The Roman Catholic priesthood, always alert at appropriating popular pagan customs, and adapting them to the service of their church, have perpetuated this old practice. The little children crowned with flowers and habited as angels, who to this day accompany the procession of the Corpus Domini at the beginning of June, are taught to scatter flowers in the road, to symbolise their own spring-time and the spring-time of nature. On this day, along the entire route of the procession at Rome, the ground is thickly strewn with Bay and other fragrant leaves. In the worship of the Madonna, flowers play an important rôle, and Roman altars are still piled up with fragrant blossoms, and still smoke with perfumed incense.

After the feast of Whitsuntide, the young Russian maidens repair to the banks of the Neva, and fling in its waters wreaths of flowers, which are tokens of affection to absent friends.

In the West of Germany and the greater part of France the ceremony is observed of bringing home on the last harvest wain a tree or bough decorated with flowers and gay ribbons, which is graciously received by the master and planted on or near the house, to remain there till the next harvest brings its successor. Some rite of this sort, Mr. Ralston says, seems to have prevailed all over the North of Europe. “So, in the autumnal harvest thanksgiving feast at Athens, it was customary to carry in sacred procession an Olive-branch wrapped in wool, called Eiresione, to the temple of Apollo, and there to leave it; and in addition to this a similar bough was solemnly placed beside the house door of every Athenian who was engaged in fruit culture or agriculture, there to remain until replaced by a similar successor twelve months later.”

Well-Flowering.

From the earliest days of the Christian era our Lord’s ascension into heaven has been commemorated by various ceremonies, one of which was the perambulation of parish boundaries. At Penkridge, in Staffordshire, as well as at Wolverhampton, long after the Reformation, the inhabitants, during the time of processioning, used to adorn their wells with boughs and flowers; and this ancient custom is still practised every year at Tissington, in Derbyshire, where it is known as “well-flowering.” There are five wells so decorated, and the mode of dressing or adorning them is this:—the flowers are inserted in moist clay and put upon boards cut in various forms, surrounded with boughs of Laurel and White Thorn, so as to give the appearance of water issuing from small grottoes. The flowers are arranged in various patterns, to give the effect of mosaic work, and are inscribed with texts of Scripture and suitable mottoes. After church, the congregation walk in procession to the wells and decorate them with these boards, as well as with garlands of flowers, boughs, &c. Flowers were cast into the wells, and from their manner of falling, lads and lasses divined as to the progress of their love affairs.

“Bring flowers! bring flowers! to the crystal well,

That springs ’neath the Willows in yonder dell.

* * * * * * * *

And we’ll scatter them over the charmed well,

And learn our fate from its mystic spell.”

“And she whose flower most tranquilly

Glides down the stream our Queen shall be.

In a crown we’ll wreath

Wild flowers that breathe;

And the maiden by whom this wreath shall be worn

Shall wear it again on her bridal morn.”—Merritt.

Before the Reformation the Celtic population of Scotland, the Hebrides, Ireland, Wales, and Cornwall were in the habit of naming wells and springs after different saints and martyrs. Though forbidden by the canons of St. Anselm, many pilgrimages continued to be made to them, and the custom was long retained of throwing nosegays into springs and fountains, and chaplets into wells. Sir Walter Scott tells us that “in Perthshire there are several wells dedicated to St. Fillan, which are still places of pilgrimage and offerings, even among Protestants.”

“Thence to St. Fillan’s blessed well

Whose spring can frenzied dreams dispel,

And the crazed brain restore.”

Into some of these Highland wells flowers are cast, and occasionally pins, while the surrounding bushes are hung with rags and shreds, in imitation of the old heathen practice. The ceremony of sprinkling rivers with flowers was probably of similar origin. Milton and Dryden both allude to this custom being in vogue as regards the Severn, and this floral rite is described in ‘The Fleece’ as follows:—

“With light fantastic toe the nymphs